1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a cowl cross assembly for vehicles, and more particularly, to a cowl cross assembly capable of reducing a weight of a cowl cross member mounted to a vehicle body, and reinforcing the coupling strength between the cowl cross member and an air conditioning equipment mounted to the cowl cross member.
2. Description of Related Art
In general, a cowl cross member is installed to a vehicle body in a horizontal direction to reinforce the strength or rigidity of the vehicle body so that the vehicle body is prevented from being twisted or bent in forward and rearward directions or left and right directions.
The cowl cross member fixes a steering system to the vehicle body and supports ducts of an air conditioning equipment, at a boundary area between an engine compartment and a passenger compartment of the vehicle
In this instance, a cowl cross bar is provided to support an instrument panel, in addition to a role of a reinforcing bar. The cowl cross bar is mounted between the passenger compartment and a dash panel, to which electronics are installed, to prevent the dash panel forming the vehicle body from moving in the passenger compartment, thereby improving the safety of passengers.
FIG. 1 is a view illustrating a cowl cross assembly in the related art.
The cowl cross assembly in the related art includes, as shown in FIG. 1, a cowl cross bar 10 formed in the shape of a circular pipe and positioned in the front region of the vehicle body, a cowl box 11 mounted to the cowl cross bar 10 to support a steering assembly, and side mounting brackets 12 for fixing both ends of the cowl cross bar 10 to the vehicle body.
However, the cowl cross assembly in the related art has a problem in that since the cowl cross bar is made of steel, the cost is high and its weight is heavy, thereby lowering gas mileage and thus deteriorating a merchantable quality. In addition, there is another problem in that the coupling strength between the cowl cross bar and the air conditioning equipment is deteriorated.
The information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.